Outrage after Hasidic paper removes Clinton from iconic photo

President Barack Obama and Vice President Joe Biden, along with with members of the national security team, receive an update on the mission against Osama bin Laden in the Situation Room of the White House in Washington, D.C., May 1, 2011.

An ultra-Hasidic newspaper in Brooklyn stirred up outrage after digitally removing Secretary of State Hillary Clinton (and National Security team member Audrey Tomason) from the iconic photo of President Obama and others watching the raid on Osama Bin Laden’s compound.

The paper, Der Tzitung, has a policy against showing photos of women, considering them “sexually suggestive.” Sure, that’s the first thing readers would have thought when Golda Meir was Israeli prime minister.

Jezebel pointed out that the action may not even be legal, since the terms on the Flickr photo stated it could not be manipulated in any way.

Writing in The Jewish Week, Rabbi Jason Miller wrote: “Der Tzitung edited Hillary Clinton out of the photo, thereby changing history. To my mind, this act of censorship is actually a violation of the Jewish legal principle of g’neivat da’at (deceit).”

Parody of the Situation Room photo

Meantime, a parody cartoon showing the nation’s leaders as superheroes shot to the top of Reddit this morning. President Obama makes a pensive Captain America, Vice President Joe Biden a hefty Flash and Clinton a relatively tame Wonder Woman, presumably covering her mouth against Kryptonite germs carried by Brigadier General Marshall B. “Brad” Webb as Superman. The headline: “That’s why bin Laden had no chance to escape.”